


Goodbye Stranger

by Mixedia



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Human, Apocalypse, Brain Damage, Car Accidents, Castiel and Mental Health Issues, F/M, Flashbacks, Hannibal style!AU, Human!Castiel - Freeform, Leviathans, Mental Health Issues, Miscarriage, Multiple Personality Disorder, Pregnancy, Schizophrenia, doctor!AU, human!Meg, still birth
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-02-24
Updated: 2014-08-05
Packaged: 2018-01-13 16:33:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 5
Words: 22,189
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1233478
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mixedia/pseuds/Mixedia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Clarence Novak has brain damage that is slowly deteriorating. The damage began causing him to hallucinate that he is an Angel called Castiel and all the people in his life are either demons, hunters, monsters or other angels living a surreal alternate reality. As his condition worsens, the veil between reality and this alternate reality begins to thin and Castiel begins slipping through the cracks into Clarence's life. His wife, Meg Novak accepted that he was on the road to death a long time ago, but wants to do everything she can to support him along the way. His best friend and doctor, Dean Smith is doing all he can to ease Meg and Clarence's lives, along with the help of his colleague, Sam Wesson. But how well will Clarence cope differentiating between reality and hallucinations when Sam, Dean and Meg are the stars in both worlds?</p><p>Inspired by Will Graham's character and mental illness from Hannibal</p><p>I don't have a beta or anyone to work on this with, so if you see any mistakes/have any ideas that you think would work to add in, or if you want to see any interactions between the characters, or even want a smut scene, PLEASE let me know!!</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. I'm an Angel

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please add a comment and let me know what you think of the story so far! I've finished editing it now so hopefully I'll get a new chapter up in a couple of days.

He opened his eyes and looked round. The field he stood in was completely different to what he had been looking at before. In the eternal Tuesday afternoon of the drowned autistic man, it was always sunny and bright. The colours were all perfect, greens were most definitely Green with a capital letter, just like the blue of the sky was Blue and the colours of the flowers were all primary colours with no shades in between. Here, the sky was the dark of night, with black clouds covering the stars and moon. The grass he stood on was inky coloured and everything he could see seemed to have been leeched of colour so it was all that inky sameness that night provides. He became vaguely aware of his toes curling in the grass, the texture tickling slightly and feeling colder than he expected and the breeze brushing over his bare arms and chest had a cold bite too. He blinked, trying to make understanding enter his mind, but it was difficult.

"Clarence!" A voice called behind him. Female, American drawl... Meg. The name hit him like a ton of bricks. Meg, she was a demon with eyes black and bottomless and her soul was a dark, thorny beauty. But when her running steps brought her round to face him, all he saw was chocolate brown eyes staring at him beneath a worried brow, her reddish brown hair wafting in the breeze a little and her arms wrapped tight around her to keep her coat from coming open. "Clarence, are you crazy? It's 24degrees out here and you're not wearing shoes or a coat. You'll freeze to death."

He tilted his head a little and looked at her with confusion. He lifted a hand and let the pads of his fingers brush over her cheekbone with a feather light touch.  
"Oh Meg, don't worry about me." He told her, his voice growling and low. "I am an angel of the Lord. I do not feel the cold."  
"Okay, well, still, I'd rather you came inside, Feathers." She replied, her own hand coming up to meet his and running down the line of his arm. Her hand found its way to his back and splayed out at the bottom, her pinkie finger teasing the edge of his pyjama bottoms and the rest pressed firmly and reassuringly against his spine. "Will you come inside for me?" She asked him, her voice velvety and comforting. He closed his eyes and let it wash over him a little, a small smile playing on his lips as he enjoyed the feeling of her warm hand on his back. It was suddenly joined by her other hand on his chest, pressing ever so slightly more as she guided him to turn round. When they were facing the right way, she slipped the rest of her arm around him, slotting herself against his side and pulling his own arm around her so he was leaning on her a little, her tiny frame somehow strong enough to support his own as they made their way through the field, up the road and back to a house.

Meg closed the door behind them and then took him over to a well padded, fabric sofa in a living room he was vaguely familiar with, sitting him down and pulling a blanket over his lap.  
"How are you feeling right now, Clarence?" Meg asked him as he inspected the room he was sitting in. He turned quickly to face her, his vision going dark for a moment as the blood in his head rushed to catch up with the movement.  
"Disoriented." He replied simply, frowning to try and alleviate some of the tension in his head. Meg sat down next to him and placed a hand gently on his knee, her way of making sure he kept his attention on her.  
"What's the last thing you remember?" She asked, her eyes fixed on his own.  
"Dogs..." He said, turning to look at the blank screen of the television in the corner of the room. "There was a show about abandoned dogs."  
"And how long ago do you think we were watching that?" Meg's hand on his knee was growing tighter as worry began seeping through her body.  
"I'm not sure..." Clarence trailed off, looking up to the ceiling as he thought. "I was Castiel for 24 hours but I only left the room 5 minutes ago." His attention snapped back to her at the sound of her sharp intake of breath. She sat staring at him, a mild look of horror on her face before she managed to pull herself back together.  
"Do you have headache?" She asked, reaching up to brush a stray lock of his hair out of his face, right where the pain in his head was worse. He was about to say that yes, he did, but then he saw the way she was looking at him, the terror dancing behind her eyes.  
"No." He said, letting a small smile shine through for her. "I feel fine."

"Well just wait right there." She instructed him, standing up and heading into the hall. "I need to call Doctor Wesson and let him know you're back home safe, alright?" He hummed his consent as he closed his eyes, pulling the blanket up a little and smelling the fabric - the scent of pumpkin, toffee apple and bonfire smoke drifting up his nose and telling him that this was most definitely her blanket. He heard her pick up the phone in the hall and opened his eyes, letting them wander round the room once again as he recognised that this is where they lived together. Just in front of the television was a picture of the two of them, smiling at the camera and holding hands. On the dark stained coffee table in front of him was a half finished cup of black coffee that he remembered drinking at dinner and two unfinished sandwiches, one peanut butter and grape jelly and one pure peanut butter - that was what they had been eating earlier. Meg tasted like peanut butter, he remembered and his favourite food was peanut butter and grape jelly sandwiches. Meg had let him have one as a treat tonight and he'd kissed her to thank her, he thought with a smile.

"Hi, Doctor Wesson? It's Meg Novak." Her voice came from the hallway and he turned to see her staring at him, her brow furrowed and her teeth worrying at her lip. "Yes, he's home safe. I found him in the back fields by our house. You were right, he hadn't gone too far."  
"Speaker phone, Meg." He told her, annoyance creeping into his voice. He didn't like it when she spoke about him and he couldn't hear the other side of the conversation, his mind told him. Meg pressed a button on the cordless phone and brought it into the room, placing it onto the table in front of him and then sitting next to him.  
"Hello." Said the man on the phone. "I want you to tell me your name, where you are and how you're feeling."

Meg turned to look at him and when he returned the look, she nudged him gently and raised her eyebrows expectantly. He leaned forward a little so his voice would carry better over the line.  
"My name is Clarence Novak." He spoke clearly, clearing his throat a little to try and get rid of the growl. "I am at my home in Lawrence, Kansas with my wife Meg. But I am feeling confused and disorientated. Hello Sam." He finished, letting the doctor know he was aware of who he was speaking with.  
"Hi Clarence." Sam replied, obvious relief in his voice. "Alright, great. Well done, you're gaining your memory quite well. What do you remember from tonight?"

Silence filled the room for a moment. Clarence wasn't sure he wanted to say it all out loud in front of Meg, especially considering what he had seen her do only hours before. But he knew she would worry about him if he didn't. He sent her a quick apologetic look, which caused her to lean forward and grasp his hand, giving it a reassuring squeeze and letting him know that of course, it was alright.  
"I was sitting in the living room, watching TV with Meg." He began slowly, speeding up as he continued. "We were watching a show about feral dogs in Phoenix, about how they get abandoned by their owners and can often become angry with humanity for the way they are treated. Meg turned to me and said maybe we should get a dog, but I told her I would prefer a Guinea Pig. She laughed and kissed me on the cheek, then went to the bathroom..."

He paused, really not wanting to continue for Meg's sake. Her hand rested on his shoulder and she smiled at him again, letting him knew she understood that what came next was out of his own control.  
"Then... I was Castiel again." He continued. "I was in the car with Jo and Ellen. We were heading to Carthage because my brother Lucifer was performing a ritual. You and Dean had found the Colt..."  
"You mean myself and Doctor Smith?" Doctor Wesson cut in so he could fully grasp what he was being told. But it made Clarence lose his train of thought for a moment and he paused, trying to connect the two doctors with the brothers he had spent the day with in his mind.  
"Yes, Dean Smith... Doctor Smith... He's Dean Winchester... Yes, that's what I..."  
"Clarence." Meg cut in, carefully brushing her fingers through his hair, brushing once again over that painful point on his forehead and relieving a little more of the pressure, helping him refocus his mind. He smiled apologetically at her again.  
"I'm sorry. I'll continue." He told them both, linking his fingers in with hers. 

"You and Doctor Smith... Sam and Dean Winchester... You had found the Colt and were planning on using it to take down my brother by shooting him in the face, hoping to stop the apocalypse. When we arrived there, I had to leave my friends. There were reapers... reapers everywhere. So many of them. I began to realise they were there to meet their boss Death, one of the horsemen of the apocalypse, so I began to follow where they were facing and ended up trapped in a circle of holy fire. Angels cannot escape from holy fire." He told them both, the growl easing out of his voice but leaving a shake of panic behind that he hoped didn't cause Meg too much worry of her own.  
"Were you alone?" Wesson asked, his voice crackling slightly as a gust of wind from outside affected the line.  
"No, my brother was there." Clarence answered, closing his eyes to help himself focus more.  
"You mean your brother Lucifer? What did you and your brother do?" Sam asked.  
"Nothing. We just talked." Clarence replied. "We were making small talk about what it was like travelling in a car - it's very slow and constricting." He joked, turning to Meg to share his amusement, but quickly letting it go when he saw she didn't quite catch it. Instead he cleared his throat, turned back to the phone and continued. "I told him if he hurt you or your brother, or tried to possess you, I would kill him myself... Then Meg came in."  
"I was there?" Meg interrupted, surprise lacing her voice.  
"Yes... you were a demon." He told her, regret at this detail leaking into his own tones. He felt her stiffen next to him for a moment, making him feel even worse, but he knew they wanted him to finish telling them everything. "You told my brother you had the Winchesters trapped using hell hounds and were waiting for instructions on whether to kill them or not."

Silence filled the room once again as the two let the information sink in, regret filling every particle of Clarence's being. Then Sam cleared his throat over the line.  
"Clarence, Meg, you have to understand the hallucinations Clarence experiences have no relevance to his everyday life. He sees people he knows in reality because that is the information his brain has to work with. It's like... having really vivid daydreams. There is no reason or meaning behind him seeing you as a demon, Meg, just like there is no reason for me or Doctor Smith to feature in his dreams other than the fact that he happens to know us. He has no control over the hallucinations and you shouldn't take it as a sign for how he feels about you."  
"I know that, of course I know that." Meg replied, rubbing her hand on Clarence's shoulder and smiling at him sympathetically. "Honestly Doctor, I'm not so worried about the content of his hallucinations, I'm worried that he's started acting on them. It wasn't so bad when he was just dreaming them, but just now he thinks he was only hallucinating for 5 minutes, meaning he's lost a good 85 minutes of time and he was standing in a field outside just wearing his pyjama bottoms when it's freezing cold outside. I don't know how long he was out there and the idea of him getting lost or stranded... He could have frozen or injured himself or worse..."

"Meg, hey Meg, I understand." Doctor Wesson cut her off, but Clarence had already heard her words and they cut deep. "Of course the forefront of both mine and Doctor Smith's minds is always Clarence's safety. I think his clinical appointments need to be increased. I already have you booked in for an appointment in 6 months but I'd much rather see you before then, if that's alright with you Clarence?"  
"Yes, of course." Clarence sighed. "The last thing I want to do is cause more concern for Meg."  
"Well that's what we're here for. I'll call Doctor Smith tonight and have him call in on you tomorrow to see how you're doing and discuss maybe adjusting your medication for the time being. I'd like to see you for a full MRI scan as soon as possible and I'm sure Dean will agree on that with me. Meg, we can sort out the details later this week if you'd like. For now, I'd like you both to go about your lives as normal. Get some rest, both of you, Meg, remember to lock all the doors as we discussed and if anything more happens, please don't hesitate to contact me. Alright?"  
"Thanks Doc." Meg replied, rubbing a hand down her tired face but looking a little more content than she had earlier.

She handed Clarence his sandwich as she hung up the phone, taking it and the coffee pot back to the hall. "The coffee's stone cold by now Clarence. I'll pour it down the drain and tidy up, then maybe we can go to bed?" She suggested, raising her voice as she walked through to the kitchen so he could still hear her.  
"Sounds like a plan." He called back, taking a nibble of his sandwich. 

Desperately, he clung to the familiarity of the taste and texture of the food as he rested the plate on his lap and reached a hand to his back. He'd been a normal human for much longer than his condition had been affecting him, so he still found it surreal when he reached back and was surprised that his fingers weren't met with the soft caress of feathers, or when he clenched a fist and they didn't tingle with grace running under his skin. He tried to do the tests when Meg was in other rooms as much as possible so she wouldn't see, but she had caught him once or twice and unfortunately, tonight was one of those nights. But even as she stopped suddenly in the doorway, staring at his contorted arm with wide eyes, he didn't stop feeling his back, trying to bring his mangled brain back to reality again, to stop missing his feathers tickling touch or the tingle of grace just under his skin. She padded over and sat next to him, once again placing a hand on his knee.

"What do they feel like?" She asked him in a half whisper. "Your wings, I mean."  
"Soft." He smiled at her as he felt along his shoulder blades, pressing the firmness of his bones and feeling the nerves reacting, telling him the touch was there from both his finger tips and his back itself. "They're huge, Meg. Black like a raven and incredible. They're a little oily too, like a duck's feathers which I suppose makes sense, keeps them waterproof. My grace is... amazing. So much power compacted into one body, I feel like I could do anything at all, like I'm completely invincible. I love my angelic body." He told her, pulling his arm back and reaching over to place his plate of sandwiches back on the coffee table in front of him.  
"M... More than you love me?" She stammered, hurt already evident on her face. His heart sank as he whipped his head round to see the hurt and upset on her features. How could she ask that of him? Turning so he was facing her with his whole body, he took her hands in his and he looked deep into her eyes.  
"No Meg, I could never love anything as much as I love you." He told her, sounding more certain than he had of anything in weeks. "I said my angelic body feels invincible, but my angelic brother taught me otherwise today. He surrounded me in holy fire... and I couldn't move. My power was completely diminished until there was nothing left, until I was nothing but a human. Normally that wouldn't have bothered me, but to Castiel? Standing in that ring of fire facing his brother who has started the apocalypse and is planning to destroy the world and half his friends? It was terrifying for him. The only thing keeping me from screaming in fear was seeing you there, although Castiel doesn't understand why he feels anything for you. You kept me feeling safe."  
"But I'm a demon." She choked out, looking down at their joined hands and playing with his fingers. "Doesn't that make me one of the bad guys?"

"But you're still my Meg." He told her, cupping her face with his spare hand and running the pad of his thumb over her cheekbone. "And to me, all that... thorny darkness I see in you... that's far more beautiful. And Castiel knows that."

She leaned forward and kissed him on the lips, just a quick pressure between them before she sank into his chest and he wrapped his arms around her, pulling her so close she was resting against him. He leaned back and she followed until they were curled up together on the sofa.  
"Hey, Clarence?" she said, breaking the silence after a few moments. He hummed to show he was listening. "You just separated yourself from Castiel. You spoke about him like he was a different being to you. I've not heard you do that before." He tilted his head in thought, going back over his own words to study what he had said and realised she was right.  
"I suppose I did." He said with a smile she couldn't see while she was nuzzled into his chest. "I guess you brought me out of it." He concluded, tilting his head down so he was looking at her and so he could plant a kiss against the top of her head.  
"I hope it lasts." She told him, squeezing him a little tighter and inhaling his scent, smiling sleepily to herself.  
"Yes... me too." He agreed, knowing that the way his condition was going, that was not going to happen.


	2. Angel Wings and Pain Relief

He clenched his hands and smiled as the tingle of grace spread through his muscles, a gentle buzzing just under his skin, reacting to his consciousness. Breathing in and puffing his chest out, he let his wings spread on either side of him, enjoying the way the wind rippled each and every feather individually. He knew he was showing off, but he really didn't care. The Winchesters weren't praying to him and as far as he could tell, the apocalypse had ended, so he let himself adjust to being an angel again. Somewhere high above him in heaven, his brothers were slaughtering one another in the name of Free Will and he guessed they would continue to do so until Raphael was taken down. But he didn't have the power he needed to take him down as of yet, so there was no point joining in the fight at this very moment, he'd likely be slaughtered himself and then he couldn't carry on his job of protecting his friends as he was commanded by his father.

Slowly, he became more and more aware of his own being, crammed into the body of Jimmy Novak who had long since vacated and found his own patch of heaven as a reward for giving up his body to act as a vessel. But then he felt a tingle of prayer, making the short hairs at the top of his neck stand on end. He closed his eyes to concentrate on it a little better, expecting to hear the demanding tones of Dean Winchester, or the softer, more caring notes of Dean's brother, Sam, or maybe even the heavily accented Redneck voice of Bobby Singer. But the voice he heard instead was a drawling woman's voice, the one that pierced through all his defenses and reached right into his grace, making it flicker in recognition. He was in the air and back on solid ground in a fraction of a second, the scent changing from pine and forest to damp, mould and abandonment. But through it all was a current of pumpkin, bonfire smoke and sulfur.

"Hello Meg." He greeted her before opening his eyes and seeing that swirling mass of dark, thorny power stuffed within the feminine vessel.  
"Peacocking for me, Clarence?" she smirked, looking pointedly at his wings, spread wide on either side of him and letting her eyes caress the way his Grace was swirling inside him. Something in his mind clicked, a conversation he hadn't had but knew all the same. He decided to ignore it for the moment.  
"I thought you had planned to lay low." He told her, folding his wings back against his body as he walked forward to stand in front of her, his posture straight and strong. "Calling me to you is like shining a beacon directly onto yourself is it not? What do you want?"  
"Maybe I just got lonely." she purred, moving forward a little and placing her hands on his chest. "Maybe I want you here to strut your peacocking self around in front of me for a bit of entertainment. Gets boring, you know, laying below the radar."

He reacted in less than a second to her words; wrapping a sudden, strong arm around her back and pressing a hand to her forehead, letting his grace caress her, he scowled down at her.  
"You're a demon, Meg. I am an Angel of the Lord. I could smite you where you stand." He growled, struggling against his own compulsion to destroy her there and then for demanding his attention for such a pointless thing. He could have been in the middle of battle, could have been on a dangerous hunt with the Winchesters and here she was praying for him like a little attention seeking child. He wasn't doing any of those at the time, of course, but she couldn't have known that. She simply infuriated him sometimes.  
"Keep talking dirty makes my meat suit all dewy." She joked, widening her eyes a moment as if in a challenge, then pushing herself away from him, of course, him letting her go. Something within him just did not want to hurt her. Not really. He sighed in frustration, wondering how she managed to get under his skin every time, but feeling more frustrated wondering why he enjoyed the sensation.

He sat down on an old, dilapidated bed that was in the room, ignoring the little puffs of dust that rose at the movement and adding to the already musty scent surrounding them, shuffling round a little until his grace was sitting more comfortably in the confined space of his vessel and his wings were supported a little better. Since gaining a vessel, he found they caused him more backache than before, a distinctly unpleasant sensation. Meg was watching him as he rearranged himself, a look of curiosity on her features and her body relaxed, hands hooked in the back pockets of her jeans and head tilted slightly to one side like she was trying to figure something out in her mind. When he was finally sat back still, she walked towards him and sat down at his feet, her hands folded in her lap and her brown eyes sparkling as they caught his icy blues in their vision.  
"What do they feel like?" She asked him, almost tentatively. "Your wings." He started a little at the question, not because it surprised him, as far as he was concerned it was her way of making small talk. But something in the back of his mind told him she had made this enquiry before, only... he hadn't been able to show her.

"Heavy." He answered, truthfully. He sat forward a little and pulled one out, letting it stretch out a little so they could both see it more clearly, grateful for the way it manipulated his muscles a little and gave some comfort. He ran a hand through the downy feathers, trying to find a way to describe them best to her. "Soft. A little oily too, like a duck's feathers which I suppose makes sense as it would keep them waterproof. My grace is... amazing. So much power compacted into one body, I feel like I could do anything at all, like I'm completely invincible. Although of course I know I'm not, just as much as you do..." He paused in his trail of thought. He felt like he'd told her those words before, de ja vu prickling his mind insistently, but last time he could only describe. This time... "Would you like to feel them?"

Her eyebrows flew into her hairline in her surprise at the offer. At the same time, her hand twitched in her lap and he wondered how long she had wanted to do exactly that.  
"Why would I want to?" She scoffed, looking away to the side, but he could detect the insincerity in her voice. "I'm a demon, I don't care. I was just making small talk."  
"Meg, we're alone here. You don't have to hide from me." He reassured her quietly, daringly. His eyes caught hers and locked in place, showing her the truth of his words. She gulped, obviously warring with her own curiosity and want versus keeping up her demonic demeanor. In the end, curiosity won. Scrambling to her feet, she came to sit on the bed next to him, on the very edge of the mattress so she wasn't resting against them. Slowly, she reached out, watching the raven black wings for any sign of movement, threatening or not as she approached. Castiel held his breath as he watched her, wondering what it would feel like to have someone other than him or his siblings touching this very angelic part of his body, a part that not even his friends had touched. Of course, being human, neither Sam or Dean could see his feathers or feel their existence, but being a demon, Meg could see beyond the veil and reach out to touch this part of him.

Finally, her fingers made contact and her thorny darkness rose to meet his bright, angelic grace. He'd expected it to hurt them, a war of the two polar opposites colliding together but instead, they wrapped around one another, testing, tasting each other before settling down together in a unity neither of them expected. Both demon and angel gasped and sat still for a moment, his hands clasped in his own lap, her finger tips hidden by the soft, tiny fibers of feathers and wing. Slowly, gently, she began to move, following the natural flow of the feathers and letting them caress the pads of her fingers. They were even softer than she had expected, almost feeling like they weren't there, but the slight tickling and the tingle of his grace meeting her darkness let her know they were. She buried her fingers deep within, feeling the warm flesh just underneath that couldn't really be seen, catching the pads of her fingers on the hard spines of feathers and running down them until she could see her fingers again. Splaying her hand out, she ran the whole thing down the surface, smiling a little at the way it caused Castiel's breathing to hitch, looking up to see his pupils blown with something she almost didn't recognise in the angel, the blue hardly visible around the black.

* * * * *

Clarence Novak was actually smiling a little in his sleep, a sight Meg Novak had not seen in months, not since his condition had worsened. She leant against the doorframe of their bedroom, her pyjamas saving her from the coolness of the wood, enjoying the sight of him resting so peacefully. His skin wasn't clammy and sweat covered, his breathing was slow and regular, his brow wasn't furrowed, for all intents and purposes he looked like a normal, perfectly healthy man. But she could just glimpse a patch of uneven hair at the back of his head, the edge of one of the bald spots where the hair couldn't grown in because of scar tissue caused by the accident that had started it all. Clarence grunted suddenly, like something had caused him a sudden, mild pain and she wondered what his other self... this... Castiel... an angel for crying out loud was doing with her husband tonight. She wished she could know, wished she could follow him into these dreams and hallucinations, wished she could see what he was seeing, feel what he was feeling. But she knew it was a side of him she would never see and it made her uncomfortably sad.

A knock sounded at their front door and she left the bedroom to go greet whoever had called round, feeling like Clarence would actually be safe without her constant vigilance for once. The silhouette on the other side of the door's glass panels was tall and broad, only able to belong to one person at this time of day.  
"Hey Dean-o." She cried as she opened the door, smiling up at the 6foot 1 figure of Dean Smith, his hair artfully spiked as always and his emerald eyes glinting in the dull light of the winter's morning.  
"Hi Meg. Is he still in bed?" Dean replied, getting right to the point.  
"Sleeping like a baby, would you believe? Come on in." She invited, stepping back so he could enter her house. He shucked his boots off at the beginning of the hallway as she wandered into the kitchen to set a kettle on to boil. Dean shuffled in, pulling out a chair at the small dining room table that was pressed against the back kitchen wall and sitting down facing her, one arm resting on the table itself and the other on the chair's back.

"Sam called last night." Dean informed her. "Said Clarence had another episode. Want to tell me about it?" Meg paused, putting down the freshly boiled kettle on the counter beside her and tilting her head down to stare into the cafetiere, watching the water she had already poured bubbling and mixing together with the ground coffee in the bottom.  
"He ended up in the back fields, muttering about Lucifer and the apocalypse again." she told him, picking the kettle back up to resume pouring water into the mixture. "I was gone for literally sixty seconds to pee and when I came back, he'd just vanished. I found him an hour and a half later, outside in nothing but his pyjama pants. Barefoot even."  
"We always knew his condition would worsen Meg. It wasn't a case of 'If', it was a case of 'When'." Dean explained with sympathy. He couldn't even imagine what she was going through. He was terrified too, but Clarence was just his best friend. This was Clarence's wife he was talking to.  
"Yeah I know." She replied, carrying the two steaming cups of coffee over to the table, then heading back to grab a sugar bowl, cream jar and two spoons, placing them on the table and then sitting opposite Dean. "I just wish we knew what's triggered it to suddenly get so much worse. It wasn't so bad when he was just dreaming these things. Why have they suddenly become hallucinations? Why are they suddenly so much more real to him now?"  
"Could be the cold?" Dean suggested, shrugging his shoulders. "The type of brain damage he has is a complete mystery to us all, both as his friends and as medical scientists. You know as well as I do he should have died that night."  
"I'm glad he didn't." Meg said simply, studying her mug of coffee intensely.

"Was last night like his other episodes? What was different this time?" Dean asked her, obviously trying to get back to the matter at hand, trying to make her study what had happened objectively so she didn't disappear into a desperate sink hole of the why's and the how's of his condition.  
"It took a few minutes for him to realise he isn't actually Castiel, that he isn't this... invincible being and that things like the cold can actually hurt him. But once it dawned on him, he was happy enough to do as I told him." She took a sip of her coffee, burning her lips a little on the hot liquid but relishing the pain as a way to ground her to the here and now as she thought about the fear she felt from the night before. "While he was talking about what he'd seen with Doctor Wesson, he still firmly believed he was Castiel, describing everything as if he had done it himself. But I sat chatting with him after we hung up the phone and he began differentiating himself, saying 'Castiel did this' and 'Castiel thinks that' rather than using 'I' and 'me'. I've never really heard him switch in the middle of a conversation or stay as himself for long periods of time since the accident. Would you take it as a sign he's getting a bit better?" She looked up suddenly at Dean, hope sparkling from her eyes in a way that wrapped around Dean's heart and squeezed painfully. He hated himself for having to break that hope she had.  
"If it is a sign, then it's a miracle. I know Sam made a new appointment for the two of you to go and see him soon, I'd like to get him through the MRI while he's there so we can get a proper look at what's going on with him physically. We can sit and talk about what's going on mentally with him until we're blue in the face, but it won't give us any more of an idea about whether the abscess has grown or not and whether there is still fluid pressing on his brain."

"Well it's nice to know the two of you enjoy such riveting conversations about me while I'm sleeping." Came a sudden voice from the entrance to the kitchen. Both Meg and Dean turned to face Clarence who was stood watching them both, pyjama bottoms riding low on his hips, hair scruffy and dishevelled and sleep written all over his face.  
"Good morning to you too, bed head." Meg smirked, getting out of her chair and moving to pour a cup of coffee for him. Dean stood up and faced his friend, who moved a little more into the room so the two men were stood right in front of one another.  
"So who am I looking at today?" Dean asked, a little nervous of the answer. Clarence sighed.  
"You are looking at Clarence Novak, human, vulnerable and in desperate need of coffee and bacon before I do this." Clarence grumbled back, narrowing his eyes at Dean as if daring him to disagree. Dean held up his hands in surrender and took half a step back as Clarence followed his wife to the counter and downed the mug of coffee she had poured for him.  
"Hot." He stated, sticking his tongue out and holding the mug in her direction. "More."  
"Not even a please?" Meg scolded him, but she turned to grin at Dean who returned the expression when Clarence began searching through the fridge for bacon.

Dean Smith sat at the kitchen table, happily watching the married couple working around one another to cook breakfast. It was almost like they were dancing, fluid like movements around one another as plates began to be filled with food for the three of them to share. As they worked, they chatted, just simple small talk, conversations about the weather, who they thought was going to win the Superbowl this year, Dean's partner, Lisa, and her son Ben who Dean had officially adopted only last year. Soon enough, the room was filled with the scent of fried food and the sound of oil crackling as their food cooked.

Then, Dean got to see something he had heard plenty about but never actually witnessed himself. At the time, Clarence had been keeping an eye on the bacon, checking underneath to see how it was browning and making sure it didn't spit on Meg. One moment he was regular Clarence, relaxed, smiling and chatting away. The next, he was completely ridged, his shoulders stiff and high, back straightened into the posture of a soldier, face blank, like he was an entirely different person. Dean watched him closely before getting Meg's attention and gesturing to him.

"Clarence?" She asked, moving over to rest a hand on his shoulder. "You with us?" Suddenly, he jerked and shivered, looking down at her and then back at the bacon before smiling at her once again.  
"Sorry, I must have spaced out." He told her, bending to kiss her on the cheek. She returned it to the part of his skin she could reach, then wandered back over to the table with buttered bread and the cafetiere.  
"I'm going to go dress." she said, pulling the shirt of her pyjamas down a little, feigning self consciousness and giving a wide eyed look to Dean before she left the room. Clarence turned to smile affectionately at her retreating back, then caught the look Dean was giving him and realised he was about to have a round of 20 questions about how he was doing. Sighing, he turned the cooker off and piled the bacon onto a plate, bringing it over to the table and sitting down opposite his friend.

"Help yourself." He said, motioning to the bacon before stabbing his fork through a few slices and making a sandwich out of them, Dean copying his motions.  
"So what happened just then?" He asked, keeping his eye on Clarence's reaction to the question.  
"Just what I said... I err... spaced out." Clarence said matter-of-factly, not looking Dean in the eyes.  
"You've always been a terrible liar, you know that?" Dean told him, smiling a little. Clarence's gaze flickered up to Dean and then back to his sandwich before replying.  
"I was in the garden again."  
"The garden of the guy who drowned?"  
"He was an autistic man when he was alive. His slice of Heaven is an eternal Tuesday afternoon. He spends his time flying a red kite. It's my favourite heaven." Clarence explained between mouthfuls of food.  
"When you 'space out', do you still get headaches?" Dean asked, slurping at his coffee, paying particular attention to how Clarence had called it 'my favourite heaven' and not 'Castiel's favourite heaven'. Clarence rested his chin on his hand for a moment before replying.  
"Do you remember when we were kids? Me and you would always sit way too close to the TV because we didn't want your sister, Jo, watching it with us and your mom would always tell us off saying we'd get headache from sitting too close?" Dean nodded. "Then there was that night when we were about 13, I came over for a sleepover at your house and we decided to find out if she was right or not, so we sat right up to the TV for an entire night and the next day, we both had raging headaches and struggled to do anything like normal human beings?" By this point Dean was laughing.  
"Mom went insane at us! Best night ever. I still can't believe we watched an entire series of Star Trek in one night." He chuckled, letting the memory wash over him.  
"And do you remember the headache after?" Clarence pushed, a smile on his lips but not joining in with Dean's laughter.  
"Yeah I remember, when you left I was almost sick it was that bad. Jo went and told mom and dad. I was grounded for about a month for that one." Dean said with a shake of his head, remembering the frustration he had felt at his sister for getting him in trouble.  
"Well that headache? That's my life. All the time now." Clarence told him, looking down at his coffee mug once again, watching as the liquid swirled around inside. Dean's face immediately fell from amused to worried and a little angry.

"Clarence, this is the stuff you're supposed to tell us about!" He chastised quietly.  
"I didn't want to worry Meg." Clarence protested back, looking abashed.  
"You don't have to tell her." Dean insisted. "I may be your best friend but I am also now your doctor too and that means I operate under Doctor-Patient-Confidentiality about this stuff. I need to know everything about your physical well-being so I can help you out, just like Sam needs to know everything about the other symptoms. Have you been taking anything for the headaches?"  
"Started out on a couple of Tylenol or aspirin, whatever I could get my hands on. Then I doubled how much I was taking..."  
"You were taking four Tylenol a day?" Dean interrupted, starting to feel a little better. His headaches couldn't have been that bad. But then Clarence shot the comfort out of the water.  
"Four Tylenol a pop." He explained. "I took four Tylenol, six times a day."

Dean looked at him, horrified for a moment. He rubbed a hand down his mouth and chin, trying to make sense of all the negative emotions the news was making him feel. Then he noticed the wording Clarence had used.  
"Wait... you started out on Tylenol and aspirin? What have you been taking recently?" Clarence cleared his throat uncomfortably.  
"Co-codamol, then I got my hands on actual codeine which I took with aspirin and ibuprofen..."  
"Oh hell Clarence." Dean growled, standing up and rubbing his hands through his hair. "Why didn't you tell me?" He hissed, spinning to face his friend again and glad Meg had decided to stay upstairs to let them have this discussion. "I could have put you on morphine weeks ago! You wouldn't have had to go through all this. We could have done an MRI and found out what's causing the pain and done something about it. It could all be being caused by fluid leaking into your head and that's something we can relieve easy enough."

"I had a car accident, Dean." Clarence stated matter-of-factly. "It's caused me to have severe brain damage and mental illness. Do you really think I'm in the right mind to come to you with a problem like this? My head has been through so much trauma, the idea of more operations is a little terrifying."

As the statement sunk in, Dean began to resemble a puppet who's strings had come loose. His arms flopped to his sides, his shoulders slumped, his face fell and he generally looked defeated. It was the first time he had heard the words from his friend's own mouth and they brought home exactly what they were dealing with. Tears began welling up in his eyes as he looked down at Clarence and he rubbed a hand down his tired face.  
"Yeah I know you did man." He choked out. "And you're fighting. You're fighting for life and doing such a great job. We're gonna get you there. I promise."  
"We're going to try." Clarence said with half a smile. Standing up, he walked round the table and pulled Dean in for a hug, the two men clutching one another tight.

"We'll try as hard as we can." Dean whispered back.


	3. Nostalgia and Schizophrenia

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I started to go into why Clarence has his condition a little although I'm sure you've all guessed what happened by now. I have the whole thing ready and waiting in my head to be published and I'm going to write it as I have in this episode, like it's flashbacks for Meg because, lets face it, Clarence is in no real state of mind for flashbacks! Please, if you've read the story so far, tell me what you think! At the moment I'm pretty much writing it for myself because I've received no feedback at all. I'm pretty much just writing this for myself. It would be so appreciated!

Meg had dropped Clarence off that morning to spend the day in the care of Doctors Smith and Wesson. While she was at home, they had done all the rigorous testing they could on him - blood tests, physical fitness, MRI screens, x-rays... other than the problems within his head he was physically as fit as he could be. This surprised neither Dean or Sam, Clarence had been a marathon runner in his spare time before his accident, but both were pleased to find he had very little muscle wastage now that he no longer went running and that his bones had recovered so well after the accident. After he had spent an hour or so in Sam's office, it became apparent that his agoraphobia was increasing and that leaving the house, even for a few hours a day was often what triggered his episodes.

"They're resembling schizophrenia more and more too." Doctor Wesson told Dean during one of their coffee breaks. "This Castiel character, he's no longer just a figment of Clarence's imagination, he's becoming a real personality for him."  
"Yeah I know." Dean replied sadly back. "It's pretty scary."

"You said you witnessed one of his episodes?" Sam asked, leaning back on the counter in the staff room and sipping his drink.  
"Must have been a mild one. If I didn't know about the state of his brain I'd have said he'd just spaced out too." Dean said back, focusing a little too much on making sure his coffee was stirred thoroughly.  
"And what sort of state is his head in?" Sam's brow puckered in worry as he questioned Dean.  
"Honestly?" Dean looked up from his drink to Sam's eyes. "How the hell that guy is still vertical is beyond me. The abscess on his brain is huge and there's a fair amount of pressure in there from fluid build up. He's in pain, but not so badly that I think he needs to go back under the scalpel. At this time I think it would cause more problems than it would solve."  
"Well that's something at least." Sam sighed, draining the last of his coffee and throwing the plastic cup in the bin. "But you said he's not telling Meg any of it?"  
"Not a word. I had to really press to get him to talk to me about it."  
"You know, maybe we should get him a psychiatrist?" Sam suggested with a shrug after a second of thought, leaning back on the counter.  
"You think Meg will be happy with that idea?" Dean replied.  
"Well, why not? If we got a professional, someone that we know, he might open up to them and if he does, they can pass it onto us and we might be able to help him more without him feeling awkward or having to talk to Meg about it. At least then we could find out if he's in pain or how he feels about it all and maybe we could help him more than we currently are without having to add yet another thing to Meg's giant 'things to do to look after Clarence' list." Sam explained.  
"Worth a shot. Yeah, why not." Dean agreed, throwing his own empty plastic cup in the bin. The idea of taking a little of the pressure off Meg was what made the idea most tempting to Dean. He'd known Meg for a good few years now and they had become friends, although she was closer to Lisa than she was him. But the way she had dropped everything in her own life so she could take care of Dean's life-long best friend was downright impressive and he admired her immensely for what she did for him on a daily basis, anything they could do to make Meg's life a little easier was definitely worth trying out in Dean's mind.

"Hey, Dean?" Sam broached as they made their way through the hospital to meet Clarence back at Sam's office after his most recent test. "Do you ever regret becoming Clarence's doctor? I mean, it can't be easy watching what's happening to him. He's been your best friend for so long and watching him deteriorate like we both know he's going to must be really tough. Or are you still glad you stepped up?"  
"Don't regret it for a second." Dean said, "I just know that, no matter who ended up treating him, I'd be looking over their shoulder the entire time, checking every move they made and worrying about what I didn't get to see. At least if we do lose him, I definitely know his doctor did absolutely everything he could to make sure he got the best treatment possible, you know?"  
"Yeah, you're right." Sam replied with a small smile. "Exactly the reason I stepped up too."

* * * * *

_Meg rubbed the sleep from her eyes and let herself yawn, a wide mouthed, full lunged yawn before she really focused on her reflection in the mirror. She couldn't quite believe the rush of excitement, happiness and love she felt every time she looked in the full length mirror attached to the wardrobe in their bedroom. She stretched for a second, working out all the kinks from being asleep, then ran a hand over her stomach, completely unable to take her eyes off the modest protrusion it was these days. Catching a slight movement in her reflection, she turned round to see Clarence staring at her from the bedroom doorway, wearing the same tie he'd worn on their wedding day, the dark blue of the fabric playing off the blue of his eyes, although of course, in true Clarence Novak style, it was back to front. She rolled her eyes at him and walked over so she could correct it for him, his gaze never leaving her own eyes._

_"You're wearing less make up than usual today." He commented vaguely, running a gentle finger down her face. Her own eyes flicked up to meet his.  
"Does it look ok? Or should I go put more on?" She asked, genuinely sounding concerned. He gave her the smallest of smiles before leaning forward and pressing his lips to first one, then the other of her eyelids._

_"I think you look beautiful." He told her, framing her face with his own hands and gently brushing the pads of his thumbs over her cheekbones. She cocked an eyebrow at him.  
"You're my husband and you're biased." She told him, swatting him lightly on the nose. Rolling his eyes, he took a step back.  
"Fine, stand over there and twirl for me." He said, gesturing to the space between their bed and the fitted wardrobes where she'd been standing a moment before.  
She did, holding her arms out slightly from her body, turning in slow circles with a small smile on her face. The dark purple dress she wore clung to all the right places on her body and hung to just above her knees, her legs covered to half way down the calves with tight black leggings, flat shoes looking odd on his petite wife as she usually wore heels when out with him, but he knew why she needed to wear them. Her dark red hair softly curled to just below her collar bones and her skin was creamy white with a pink blush just creeping into her cheeks at the attention he was paying her. Clarence watched her, feeling the pride and joy at her changing body filling him from the inside. All he could think about as he watched her was how lucky he was to have her as his wife and she must have been able to read it on his face. She stopped spinning after a while and looked back at him with a look of wonder on her face._

_"Why are you so sweet on me, Clarence?" she asked him, voice deep and husky, walking over and wrapping her arms around his neck. He sighed, wrapping his own around her waist.  
"You know, I have no idea." He replied, looking as if he was putting serious thought into it. "Might be something to do with how beautiful you are, might have something to do with the amazing devilled eggs you make for me every Saturday morning, or that you make the best angel cake in the state because we all know that the fastest way to a man's heart is through his stomach."  
"Keep that up and I might have to limit how much time you spend with Dean-o you know. We both know he can cook like a professional and if it's so easy to get into your heart through your stomach then I have some serious competition!" She cut in, letting him know she wasn't buying any of it. He looked back down at her and his expression softened.  
"Or it might be because I am completely in love with you." He grinned at her, kissing her on the cheek, then tapping her bottom. "Come on, we don't want to be late."_

_Meg sat in the passenger side of the car and waited for Clarence to lock the house, get in the driver's side and start the engine. As soon as it was started, they both shared a secret grin as the sound of Guns 'n' Roses "Sweet child of mine" filled the vehicle.  
"So how are you feeling today?" He asked her as he pulled out of their driveway. "Nervous? Excited?"  
"Excited." She stated. "Honestly, I don't care what it is, I just want to know everything's going okay."  
"Yeah, me too." He agreed, carefully sticking to the speed limit as he drove down the road.  
"Promise me though, if it is a girl you won't suggest 'Bela' as a name." She said, turning to him and grinning.  
"It's not a bad name..." He hedged, "Just unfortunately has the connotation of your mother." He added matter-of-factly.  
"Exactly my point! Which is why if we have a boy we shouldn't name him 'Nick' either."  
"Well if we're not naming it after your parents then 'Chuck' and 'Becky' like mine are out too." He said, slowing down to let a family cross the crossing in front of them. "Although any parent that names their first child 'Chuck' has really bad taste."_

_They were both quiet for a moment or two as the last few notes of 'Sweet Child of mine' rang out and the DJ began gearing up for the next track. They could see the next set of traffic lights ahead were green, but Clarence dropped down 5mph anyway, just in case, then another 5 when he saw the lights change to amber, pulling to a careful, well timed stop as they changed finally to red._

_"Why don't we push the boat out?" He suggested, "Why don't we find a name neither of us have ever known another person to have?"  
"But I'd like it to mean something really special to us." Meg told him.  
"Surely it would mean something really special to us after a while." He turned to her, smiling and placing his hand on her stomach. "It would be the name of our son or daughter. Our child's name."  
The words finally hit home for both of them, they were going to be parents, a new, tiny life was growing inside Meg and both of them gasped for a moment at the idea. They sat smiling for a moment before Clarence turned back to see the light changing to green. He counted aloud 3 seconds before pulling out, gently easing the accelerator down as they began to move._

_The next few seconds were a blur._

* * * * *

Meg took a deep breath as she stared into their bedroom, remembering that moment well over a year ago now. She was stood where Clarence had stood watching her twirl before the mirror, showing off her ever growing pregnant bump to him as they had prepared for her second scan to find out the gender of their child. She still felt a pang of regret and sadness as she thought about that day, a pang she knew she would never stop feeling for as long as she lived.  
Downstairs, she heard the door open and close and a female voice shouted through the house.

"Meg? Are you home?"  
Sighing to try and alleviate some of her emotions, she half turned her head to reply "I'm upstairs, come on in."  
She heard Lisa Braeden's voice instructing her son "Take your shoes off, Ben. Go sit in the living room, I'm sure Meg won't mind if you turn the TV on. I'm going to check on her." and her son's quiet "Okay mom." in response before Lisa's feet began tapping on the stairs as she made her way up. Meg didn't turn to greet her friend, knowing Lisa would understand. In the weeks after the accident, Lisa had often found Meg standing here, staring off into the distance of their room and she always knew exactly what to do.  
Curling her arms around Meg's waist, she rested her chin on her shoulder and cuddled her close.

"You okay?" She asked her friend, sounding worried.  
"Yeah." Meg sighed. "Just nervous about what they're going to find." Lisa huffed out a breath, tilted her face and kissed Meg's shoulder, trying to give her some comfort.  
"You know Dean will do all he can to make sure Clarence is as well as he can be, right?" Lisa mumbled into her shoulder, looking through her lashes at their marital bedroom.  
"Yeah I know. Of course I know." Meg replied, twitching slightly to warn Lisa she wanted to move away. "But even Sam and Dean can't work miracles and stop the inevitable." Lisa stood in front of Meg, a hand on either arm as she took a deep breath to compose herself, giving a weak smile after. "Sorry." She apologised.  
"You have nothing to be sorry for." Lisa scolded her mildly. "You've been through hell and you have every right to have your moments. I'm just glad I was here to catch this one." She smiled, earning another smile from Meg for her words. "Now, come downstairs, let me make you a drink. We can sit and chat until you feel better, then we can head over to the hospital to pick up our boys. Sound like a plan?"  
"Thanks Lisa." Meg replied, already feeling her spirits lifting a little as she followed her down the stairs.

* * * * *

Meg could see the exact moment he stopped being Clarence. Lisa and Ben had stayed in the hospital, waiting for Dean to finish up his shift and get changed. They were planning on a family meal at a restaurant nearby so Meg had left them there so her and Clarence could go home. He'd been quiet when they met up, too quiet, not wanting to talk about his clinic appointment at all which was unusual for him. Normally a day spent doing the tests and hanging around with Sam and Dean, even if it was all for his health's benefit, put him in such a good mood she'd barely be able to get a word in between him telling her about how it all had gone. But the car ride home was awkward. He'd been Clarence, albeit moody Clarence, right up until he had climbed into the car but all of a sudden his expression had flat-lined, his posture straightened out to that of a soldier and he had that look in his eyes, that look that she came to recognise as Castiel instead of Clarence.

She didn't mention it in the car, instead choosing to be silent to let him think. She turned off the radio and drove careful and steady right back to the house. As soon as the car stopped in their driveway, Clarence was out the door and in the house. Sighing, resigning herself to a bad night, she clambered out and followed him in. She couldn't believe when she caught him half way up the stairs, still wearing his shoes. Clarence was a man of habit and he always shucked his shoes off immediately entering their house.  
"Clarence?" She called after him, confusion leaking into her voice. He stopped, suddenly tense on the stairs, one foot on them and one foot dangling in mid air. His head flopped down and he took a breath in that was so full of anger she was actually afraid for a moment. Then, his hand curled into a fist which he pounded into the wall so hard, one of their wedding photographs fell off the wall and onto the floor, a tinkling sound ringing out as the glass smashed. "Clarence!" She shouted, starting to feel angry herself. She looked from the photograph on the floor up to him, wide eyed to see he had spun round on the step and was glaring down at her. "Clarence, what the hell has gotten into you?" She demanded.

* * * * *

"Dean?" He said through the door, listening hard for any sounds of movement, but there was nothing. "Dean?" He growled again, reaching up to pull the cover off the looking hole in the panic room door. Tendrils of panic began to fill him at the sight of the overturned chair on the floor, with Dean nowhere to be seen and so he opened the door and walked in.

"Cas..." He heard from the side of the room. Spinning round, he locked eyes with that awful, dead look in Dean Winchesters emerald greens, knowing this had to be some trick. So he wasn't entirely surprised when Dean closed the door of the metal cabinet Bobby had installed into the room to show he had drawn the angel banishing sigil on it in his own blood. As soon as Dean's bloodied hand slapped onto the metal, the familiar agonising sensation of banishment filled him as his vessel burst into white light and he was thrown from the room, his last thoughts angry and speaking of betrayal.

"Clarence, what's going on with you?" He heard a female voice shouting briefly as he was thrown across the world, but he had no idea where it came from.

Landing with a thud and skidding along the sandy shores of a beach somewhere - Spain he suspected - Castiel stood and curled his fists in anger. Breathing deep to try and get his emotions back under control, he closed his eyes and concentrated, hard.  
"Our Father, Who art in Heaven..." He heard, coming in with the tingle of prayer at the back of his neck, sending all the fine hairs to stand to attention as Dean's face came to view. Calling his Grace to power, he raised his wings and flew fast to the spot the man was praying on.  
"You pray too loud." He told the preacher, touching him on the shoulder and sending him into a slumber. Wrapping his hands in Dean's jacket, he pulled him around and shoved him into the wall of the alleyway nearby.

"What are you crazy?" Dean growled, already beginning to fight back. But Castiel wasn't listening. His vision was red, his vessel hot with the rage that was consuming him. He flung Dean across the alleyway and into a bin.  
"I REBELLED FOR THIS?" He screamed, following after him. His hands curled into fists and soon he was landing punch after punch into his friend's cheekbone. "So you could surrender to them?" He pulled Dean back up by his jacket so they could look each other in the eye for a moment before flinging him back across the alley and into another wall. Ignoring Dean's begs for mercy, he began raining punches once again, trying to get the anger out of his system. "I gave everything for you and this is what you give to me?" He snarled, pulling him back round so he was no longer backed up against a wall. He landed one final, devastating punch which had Dean doubling over, perfect for him to raise his leg and deliver an almighty kick, sending Dean sprawling against the wire fence behind him.  
Walking the few steps over, he stood glaring down at the Righteous man before him, not caring about the blood splattered over his face, or the deep gash on his cheekbone, the bone itself almost poking through. Dean lay, spluttering and gasping for a moment, then looked up and noticed Castiel's tight fists hanging at his sides. Looking him in the eyes, he scowled.

"Do it." Dean dared him. "Just do it!" He shouted when Castiel didn't move. They stared one another down for several long moments, Dean still gasping through the pain and Castiel slowly letting the red seep from his vision, returning it to normal. He let the tension go from his fist, after all, as much as Dean had angered him, he wasn't here to kill him, although it would have been an easy thing to do. Instead, he stepped forward and pressed his fingers to Dean's shoulder in the same way he had to the preacher on the street to send him into unconsciousness. Standing back, he closed his eyes and sighed.

* * * * *

When he came to, he was standing on the stairs at his home, broken frames and glass covering the stairs and their pictures littering the floor. At the bottom of the stairs, Meg was looking up at him, her brown eyes wide and fearful, her pose defensive. But she hadn't run away.  
"Meg?" He asked her, ignoring the way his voice cracked in his confusion and the way it irritated, like he had been screaming. She let out a big breath and relaxed, carding her fingers into her hair and holding her head.

"You back, Clarence?" She asked him, her gaze flicking to the mess on the floor before returning back to him.  
"Yes, I think so." He told her, studying the floor too, then looking at the wall next to him, seeing the cracks all over it. He tried to open his own fist but it sent shooting pains up his arm to the elbow, making him gasp in shock.

"Wouldn't do that if I were you." Meg told him, slipping on some shoes so her feet wouldn't get cut as she climbed the stairs to join him, holding his bloodied hand up for him to see. "You made a bit of a mess of yourself. We better get you back to the hospital, see if we can catch Dean before he goes off to lunch with Lisa."  
"No!" Clarence shouted, backing off a step and wrenching his fist out of her grip, holding it to his own chest protectively. "No, I don't want to see Dean." He told her, his shoulders hunching up to be even more protective, looking like he was trying to make himself as small as possible, his eyes flicking between her and the door, looking petrified.  
"Alright, it's fine." She said, holding her hands up in surrender. "Boy, what did he do to get your tail feathers all jittery?"  
"I don't have a tail Meg, only wings." He mumbled back, looking up at her from his hand. She was stuck for a moment, not sure how to respond. In the end, she decided to ignore it and held out her hand to him.

"Come on, we'll go to the kitchen and I can sort your hand out for you." She told him, wiggling her fingers a little so he would place his hand in hers.  
"You know how to do that?" He asked, his face covered in interest that made Meg even more worried than before.  
"Yes, Clarence. I'm a nurse, remember?" She replied, watching as he placed his less beat-up hand in hers and wrapping her fingers gently over his, pulling a little so he would follow her.  
"I thought you only played one on TV." He said, remembering a conversation from a while ago.  
"No, it was my job before all this." She replied, purposefully missing out mentioning the accident, the worry in her gut increasing.

She placed him on a chair at the dining room table when they got to the kitchen, making sure he was comfortable before grabbing her old nursing equipment from a cabinet. Sitting in front of him on a chair, she began to clean his hands, making sure there was no paint or plaster from the walls in the cuts.  
"So you wanna tell me what this was about?" She asked as she worked.

"Dean betrayed me." He replied immediately, soon realising he hadn't quite got his head straightened out yet. Meg's hands had stilled as she looked up at him.  
"Betrayed you?" She repeated. "Those are some strong words Clarence. How so?" She bent back over his hands and continued cleaning as he sighed.  
"I've not got my head straight yet. I'm sorry." He admitted. "Sam and Dean both think it would be wise for me to see a psychiatrist to work on my schizophrenia and other mental problems."  
"You not so much huh?" She asked, leaning back a little so she could dip a new cotton wool bud in the bowl of watered down iodine solution she was using as disinfectant on his cuts.

"I'm fine." He tried to tell her, flexing the hand she wasn't working on slightly to ease some of the tight feeling it was gaining from the congealing blood. She sat back and stared at him incredulously.  
"You call this 'fine'?" She asked, "Clarence, you are far from fine. Listen," She continued, backtracking a little when she saw the hurt creeping into his features, "We always knew your mental health was going to be an issue but maybe seeing a psychiatrist will help stop it from leaking out and affecting your real life so much." Clarence huffed in response.  
Meg sighed, staring at him for another moment before bending down to work again.  
"And why is Castiel angry with Dean?" She asked, putting the cotton bud back on the table and pressing the two sides of the gash in his hand together to see what would be the best way to joining them up. Clarence stared back at her in shock.

"What?" He asked.  
"What?" She parroted, looking back to meet his eyes.  
"You're asking about Castiel's feelings." He explained. "You've never done that before."  
She sat back in her chair as she took out a tube of superglue and all the paraphernalia she would need to use it on his knuckles.  
"Castiel just punched the crap out of our staircase wall and smashed all our wedding photographs." she told him, "I think I need to understand the guy a bit more at this point to decide whether I'm in danger around him or not."

Clarence felt winded. He couldn't get a breath either in or out, it was like someone had punched him in the gut. Meg was afraid to be around him? Suddenly, he was on the precipice of a ledge, looking down into a black abyss which he remembered vaguely from the time Castiel had invaded hell to find Dean and pull him back out. He knew if Meg decided she was in danger enough to leave him or place him in a home like some of the other doctors had suggested, he would fall into that abyss, but without the grace and wings of Castiel he would never find his way back out. Forgetting about the gaping wounds on his hands, he lifted them to gently frame her face. Her eyes quickly flashed back to his, wide and fearful as she searched, trying to figure out who was in her husband at that time. He scooted forward on his chair so their lips were inches apart.

"Castiel will never lay a finger on you Meg." He promised her. "I won't let him. You will never have anything to fear from him. I love you, with everything that I am. You are my entire world and nothing bad will ever happen to you. Do you understand me?" That awful winded feeling returned when he felt a hot dribble of wet sliding down his hand and realised Meg was crying. But she smiled at him and sniffled, nodding her head in his hands and placing her hands on his thighs.  
"Just checking Clarence." She told him, sitting forward a little herself so she could plant her lips on his own and give him the first kiss they had shared for weeks. It was all warm, wet sweetness and it calmed him enough for him to sit back and give her a proper, genuine smile, enjoying the way his heart was thumping in his chest at the contact and the fluffy moment they had shared together.

Breathing in, Meg cleared her throat, wiped her hands under her eyes and looked back at him.  
"Let's get your hands closed back up shall we?" She suggested, picking the tube of superglue back up and bending over his injured hands once again so she could work her healing magic.


	4. Bittersweet victories

_Life had not gone well for Donald Stark, although he'd believed the world had been his oyster back in school. Donald had been popular - Quarter back on the school's football team and loving boyfriend to his high school sweetheart and leader of the cheerleading squad - Margaret Rydin, they had had the perfect American life. The couple had met at their parent's church and both families fully supported the couple. But when neither of them had scored the scholarships they had been looking for to make it to college, they had had to find other means to get them through life. Maggie had got a job at the local bar and fast food restaurant, working double shifts and Don had bounced from job to job, trying to find something high paying enough to get them out of their crummy studio apartment. Although they stayed loyal to one another and stayed together, neither had been particularly happy and had both fallen into bad crowds of friends - suddenly finding their lives filled with drugs and gambling. After a harsh intervention from their families, however, Don and Maggie had entered rehab and walked out clean, right into their families' church where they were married under the eyes of God and their watchful parents._

_Their first year of marriage had been bliss - they had honeymooned a state over for two weeks before returning home where Maggie once again picked up her waitressing job at the bar and Don had finally found a well paying job as a truck driver. Maggie had struggled with the idea of Don leaving her alone for long periods of time while he made deliveries, but she had handled it by surrounding herself with friends and family, who often asked her when her and Don were planning on expanding their little unit of 2 to 3._

_After a night of drinking and laughing together, Don and Maggie had finally decided it was time to do exactly as their friends and family were pressuring them to do and decided to try for a family of their own, but it soon became apparent that it wasn't going to happen naturally, definitely not through lack of trying. In the end they crept off quietly to a fertility doctor to find out what was going wrong, only to be told that their years of bad crowds and drugs had caused Don to have a very low sperm count and one of Maggie's ovaries to have died, meaning it would be nearly impossible for them to conceive without expensive IVF treatment._

_That night was very tense in the Stark household as the couple ate their dinner in silence. The tension became too much when the food was finished and they ended up spending the rest of the night screaming at one another, much to their neighbour's annoyance. Don slept on the sofa that night, having drunk half a bottle of whiskey causing him to be too heavily asleep to notice Maggie slipping out the next morning. But she was soon back, screaming at Don and throwing scrunched up bits of paper at him. From her rage filled words and the rolled up balls of paper on the floor, which Don smoothed out on his knee to read, he worked out that Maggie had gone to try and annul their marriage because they could not fulfil their vow of procreation, which had been rejected by the church as infertility did not count towards Don refusing to fulfil the vow - he simply couldn't and that was not his fault. The church had advised Maggie to adopt which she said was absolutely not going to happen._

_Don himself got angry, his ego having taken a beating - he now believed Maggie only wanted to be with him to have children._  
"Well when you're running off round the country in your big stupid truck, is it any wonder I want a bit of company in this God forsaken place you make me live in?" Maggie had shrieked at him.  
"I go running off in my 'Big stupid truck' so I can afford to get you out of this 'God forsaken place' in the first place Maggie." Don had bit back, sitting on the sofa and looking down at the floor, pointedly not looking her in the eye.  
"But I'll bet driving isn't all you do when you're on the road, is it Don?" Maggie spat back, pointing an accusatory finger at him. "I saw the lipstick stain on your shirt Don, and I have never worn Chanel in my life. I can't afford it with the measly amount of money you give me to fill your cupboards."  
"Would you listen to yourself Maggie?" He shouted back, standing up and scraping his hands through his hair. "I would never run off with another woman. I was having a quiet drink in a bar and some... Hussy decided she was going to try and get me between her sheets."  
"Ohhh and I'll bet you were so upset about that weren't you?" Maggie raged at him.  
"Yes I was, actually Maggie, of course I was. You know why?" He asked, his eyes showing all the hurt he was feeling as he glared at her, "Because she wasn't my wife! Although she probably would have been more faithful than my 'darling' wife back home!" He emphasised the words with his fingers, drawing quotation marks in the air.  
"And what's that supposed to mean?" She shrieked, rounding back on him and getting right into his face.  
"It's supposed to mean I can't afford Calvin Clein tidy whities, Maggie, and you know it." He told her, not caring about the spittle that landed on her face as he ground out the words. 

_Maggie stood, staring at him in shock and both fell silent as they reached their stalemate. Don had his jaw clenched and Maggie's hands were fists at her side. They glared at each other in a rage filled staring contest - it was Maggie who looked away first._  
"Get out." She told him calmly, not moving but no longer looking him in the face.  
"This is my home Maggie, you can't throw me out of my own property." He said, equally as calmly and not budging one inch. But then Maggie reached into her handbag and pulled out a final document, one that hadn't been rolled up and thrown at him during their argument.  
"Not anymore it's not." She explained, holding it up so he could see. "This is an exact copy of the contract and deeds for the Apartment. There was a loophole in the original contract that said I could take the apartment off you if I paid three-quarters of what you originally paid meaning all documents and deeds for the house and all possessions within it are now mine. Get out of my home, Donald." 

_Don stood in shock, reading the piece of paper before him that essentially made him legally homeless. His eyes moved from the document to his wife._  
"Maggie-"  
"GET OUT DONALD." She exploded, actually shaking with the vehemence of her words. Don stood for another full minute as his brain worked around exactly how much she had just taken from him. In the end though, he realised there was nothing he could do. He had happily signed that contract, loophole and all when they had first moved in together, never believing for a minute that everything could go so wrong. He had been so in love with her and now... 

_He stood staring at the apartment building once he was back outside, the harsh wind bringing a reminder of everything back to him. Climbing into his truck, he vowed then and there that he would never let anyone or anything screw him over like Maggie just had. Starting the engine, he drove away from the building for the last time, not even looking back and trying to put Maggie and their whole life together behind him._

_He stopped at the first gas station he found, planning on only filling his truck up as much as he could and then driving in a straight line until the tank was empty, settling down in whatever village, town or city he ended up in. But as he was stood at the cash register, paying, he noticed the alcohol bottles. $100 down and 3 litres of whiskey up, he climbed back in his truck and drove, a bottle always to his lips so when he wasn't downing the strong liquid, he was inhaling it. He turned up the radio and drove, always in a straight line and never looking out to either side. By the time he hit the first city, he was pretty smashed. Everything was blurry and he was convinced he was driving down 3 roads at the same time, not 1. The alcohol was making him sleepy and everything looked so dark, it had to be night time. Under that logic, he realised he was too drunk to be driving through a city and knew if a cop came by, they would almost certainly pull him over and arrest him for drunk-driving. Therefore, he had to get back to the highway where less Police Patrols would be going past and he could find some cheap motel to sleep off his alcohol. But first he had to drive in a straight line through the city as fast as he could. He saw the light ahead of him turning red - but it was night time and no camera was going to pick up on him going through a red at this time... what time was it anyway? He looked at the clock on his dash board but realised he was too drunk to read it, he couldn't trust himself to read the time when there was three clocks to read from!_

_The traffic lights ahead were still a long way off and he suddenly recognised the sounds of Axl Rose singing "Sweet Child of Mine" filling his truck cab. He turned up the radio and sang along loudly, knowing there was plenty of time for the song to finish before he reached the traffic lights. This was good, he told himself, because he'd have to turn the music down once he got to the lights, didn't want any late-night cops driving past and hearing his loud music, asking him to turn it down so he would be best off turning it down himself - which he did as the last few notes died away and the DJ began introducing the next song._

_"What a beautiful song by the amazing Guns and Roses with Sweet Child of Mine." The DJ told Don through his speakers. "Got a real treat for all you lads and ladies now with something a bit old and classy so here we are with Creedence Clearwater and Bad Moon Rising."_

_Don laughed out loud, he had a particular soft spot for this song, it had been his first dance with Maggie the night they had met. But then he remembered Maggie and how she had unceremoniously tossed him from his home only a few hours previously. The memory made him so angry, he shoved his foot down hard on the accelerator. Somewhere in the back of his mind, something triggered to tell him the light had gone red once again but he didn't really notice. Not until the unmistakable screech of metal sounded over the music playing in his cab and he heard people screaming outside._

_Suddenly, his eyes shot open and the day didn't look so dark anymore. Suddenly, the sun was streaming from behind and there were people he hadn't noticed all over the pavements. Instinct had made him slam his foot on the brake so when he came back to himself, he was sitting still in his cab, the engine still running, but something hot and wet trickling down the side of his head.  
"Son of a..." he muttered as he touched the wet and his hand came back red - he realised he must have hit his head when he slammed the brakes on so hard. The people on the pavements, the people getting out of cars, the people running from the houses on either side, so many people all pointing and screaming and running, some shouting into their cell phones, some running in front of his cab. He got worried they were going to damage the truck and stumbled out in a rage to stop them._

_That's when he saw the pile of metal, rubber and fabric that had once been a car, warped and twisted to fit around the front of his cab... there was blood... dribbling from where the two front doors of the car had been. The trunk had popped open to reveal all the paraphernalia needed for a new born baby._

_"MEG!! CLARENCE!!" Someone was screaming, a girl with long, curly blonde hair rushing forward and reaching in through the holes where the windows had been, sobbing so hard no tears could actually escape her eyes.  
"I didn't see them..." Don explained, weakly, as he looked at the mess he had caused._

* * * * *

Castiel was confused. He'd been sure only a few moments before he'd been fighting against a horseman with Dean - stuck in some diner eating raw meat from a pan while Dean battled against famine. But all of a sudden he found himself in the corridor of a warehouse, eyes closed and hands resting against warm, soft, feminine skin as he tasted peanut butter. Hands were wandering inside his coat and the scent of Meg the demon surrounded him - all peanut butter, pumpkin, brimstone and sulphur. When she pulled away, he stared down into her deep brown eyes, half lidded and slightly blown with lust and felt a twinge of something he didn't really understand deep in his gut. He felt her wrapping her fingers around the hilt of his angel blade and pulling back further, but he didn't want that. The smell of her was so familiar and he already missed the taste, he had to have more. Wrapping a strong arm around her back, he swung her round and pressed her into the wall. Ignoring the confused and surprised sounds of Sam and Dean and the angry barking of hell hounds on the other side of the door, he claimed her mouth with his own, flicking her lips with his tongue until she opened up to him and he could get more of that peanut buttery taste that was entirely Meg. He found his own hands roaming, wandering over soft curves, warm flesh, everything so familiar, but it shouldn't be. Castiel was an angel of the Lord and had never known the pleasures of the female form before.

Except he had.

* * * * *

When he opened his eyes, the room around him was warm and dark. Moonlight streamed in through the crack in the curtains over the window and he was covered in a heavy duvet. Meg was no longer stood in front of him but laid beside him, breathing soft and steady in sleep. He rested a hand against his own forehead, realising he was back to himself, back to Clarence and that the Meg laid next to him on the bed was his wife, Meg, the human - although she still tasted of peanut butter. He leaned over her sleeping form a little so he could get a peak at her face and was intrigued at how peaceful she looked, how... beautiful. Her hair fell in soft curls around her face, her eyes covered over with a thin film of lavender eyelid. Her pink lips were puckered slightly and her breath was coming out in soft puffs, in time with the steady rise and fall of her plump breasts, which were just visible, sneaking away from his look under the duvet. He felt himself smile and that warm pulse that he recognised as love seeping out from his chest and rushing round his body, concentrating especially low in his gut and between his legs. Dropping down slightly, he pressed his lips against her shoulder that was in the air as she slept on her side, smiling against it as he heard her give a gentle grunt and began stirring.

Nuzzling his nose against her arm, he waited for her to wake, smiling the entire time, knowing he was about to see that look in her eyes that melted him from the inside out every time.  
"Clarence?" She mumbled, voice thick with sleep and arm moving up to rub against her eyes. "Clarence, are you alright?" She asked, worry seeping into her tones a little. His caretaker, her first thoughts of every day always about him.  
"I'm fine, Meg." He told her, nosing at her arm again and kissing her once, twice, three times more. He caught the faint outline of her grinning in the darkness.  
"Is that you Clarence, or has Castiel finally learnt affection?" She asked, a sleepy laugh escaping her that gripped his heart tight and made it stutter. He wondered how many times Meg had woken in the last year to find herself sleeping with a strange angel named Castiel and not her husband.  
"It's really me, Meg." He whispered, trailing his fingers lightly up her thigh under the duvet, round to over her stomach and splaying his hand out there. "Hear my soul speak: The very instant that I saw you, did my heart fly to your service." He recited, his lips ghosting over her skin as his hand brushed against her abdomen. Her smile grew as she recognised the Shakespearian quote he had included amongst his wedding vows to her and let her know it really was her Clarence in her bed.

But her eyes shot open and her face dropped when she felt him freeze, head not moving from her arm so she knew he'd also stopped breathing for a moment.  
"Clarence?" she asked, when she suddenly realised what he was feeling. "Clarence, it's ok." She told him sternly, grabbing his hand and moving his finger tips away from the huge, ugly scar on her lower stomach. But he shook his head, face still frozen into the look of horror as he pulled his hand out of her grasp and moved it to the scar, tracing the rough, pink line with his fingers. Meg lay absolutely still, now on her back, letting him feel it and watching his face carefully, worried how he was going to react. He sat up and pulled the bed covers back, peeling her night shirt up her stomach so he could get a proper look at the angry, shiny pink welt and trace it with both fingers and eyes.  
"Was this..." He choked, not able to finish the words himself.  
"That was where they ended my pregnancy." she whispered back to him, her own voice calm and steady as she explained it to him. His big blue eyes grew wider as they caught hers, fear and grief glistening in the bright blue of the irises.  
"Oh Meg." He whispered. "How much did you lose that day?"  
"I still have you." She consoled him, running the pad of her thumb tenderly over his cheekbone.  
"But I'm not even me." He argued. "I've not been me for so long, I'm just a stranger in your life..."

He sat up in bed and crossed his legs, his head resting in his hands as he allowed himself a moment of misery. Meg scrambled up and over to him, sitting in the juncture of his legs, wrapping her own around his waist and placing her hands on the back of his neck. They stared into one another's eyes, foreheads touching for a few moments before Meg pulled him forward, guiding him to rest his head on her shoulder. They cuddled in silence as Clarence got a hold of himself and his mind quieted. There were so many things she wanted to say to him, so many assurances, so many tidbits as to why she still loved him. But in the end, she decided to follow his lead and continue quoting Shakespear. She pulled back from him again and framed his face with her hands so he had no choice but to look at her in the eyes as she recited.

"Love looks not with the eyes but with the mind and is therefore wing'd Cupid, painted blind. Nor hath loves mind of a judgement taste." She told him, smiling a little. "I don't care what happens Clarence, you are still my husband and that means I'm in it for better or for worse. You understand? And Castiel may be a stranger, but a stranger is just a friend I don't know yet."   
Clarence gave her a small, sad smile and then continued her quote.  
"Wings and no eyes figure unheedy haste" He finished, beginning to grin a little. "Guess the 'Wing'd' part of that particular paragraph has taken on an entirely different meaning now, huh?" He laughed a little, his amusement spreading to her and allowing her to laugh a little too.

As their laughter died down and the room returned to silence, they just sat, holding each other and watching the others eyes, foreheads pressed together and their breath mingling in the space between them. Then, Clarence leaned forward and pressed his lips to hers. It was a sweet kiss, a small gesture of reassurance from one to the other and a reminder of who they had been once upon a time. Meg's breath caught, the feeling of intimacy between the two so familiar and yet so long forgotten it had her pulse racing. She kept her eyes shut as he pulled away, breathing deep and enjoying the way her lips tingled, even as she missed his touch.

When Clarence had been in hospital, the doctors had come to talk to Meg about his injuries and his condition. They had told her in order for his body to heal after such a trauma, he would need to stay away from physical activities for at least 6 months. The doctors didn't need to tell her sex and intimacy was classed as physical activity, she already knew, but they told her anyway, stressing exactly how damaging it could be to his system. So they had stayed away from all sexual activities for the guided 6 months, but by that time it had become apparent that Clarence's head wasn't in the right place. Meg felt that while Clarence's head wasn't entirely his own, any form of sexual activity that he didn't instigate would be unfair and didn't sit comfortably with her. But as Castiel had become more and more a part of Clarence, he had dissolved within himself to the point where staying away from sex, kissing or even hugs just became routine and the closest, most intimate activity they had with one another was when they slept at night or when Clarence needed help looking after himself. She would bathe him, clothe him in the mornings and sometimes even help him with going to the bathroom, none of these activities sexual in the slightest, just a wife helping her husband stay healthy.

So when she opened her eyes that night to look back into his own blue hues and saw how blown his pupils were, how the blue that was usually so light and bright was now dark with lust and hunger, it took her breath away more than she expected. That night, Clarence came to grips with Meg's changed body. He explored each and every mark, each scar, each welt that was left from their accident and Meg, after over a year, finally got to spend a night with her husband without once being interrupted by unwanted angels.

* * * * *

The next day, Meg came back to consciousness slowly. The bed was so warm and comfortable she almost didn't want to wake up, but when she moved her hand across to see if Clarence was awake yet, she came across nothing but empty space.  
"Clarence?" She grunted, cracking her eyes open and sitting up, rubbing a hand down her sleepy face and looking round to see the bedroom completely empty of her husband. Looking over to their tiny en-suite bathroom, she knew immediately he wasn't in there either. "Clarence." She said aloud, her voice demanding him to answer her. Panic began welling up inside her, wondering if he had lost himself again and gone wandering. Suddenly their activities in the night seemed like such a terrible idea and she was mentally kicking herself when another of her senses prickled to life.

Her nose told her about it first, catching the scent of bacon drafting up from another part of the house and soon her ears joined in, telling her they could hear sizzling from the kitchen. Frowning, she threw her legs over the side of the bed, her toes brushing up against her pyjamas which she quickly scrambled to put on. She took down her dressing gown from where it was hanging - alone she noticed - on the back of their bedroom door and slipped on her slippers which were at the side of the door frame - also alone - before striding off downstairs.

The sight that greeted her was one from her past, filled with nostalgia and warm, fluffy domesticity it broke her face into a happy smile. Over at the stove, wearing his too-big, deep blue dressing gown and causing little slapping sounds as he walked across the work surface from his slippers that weren't quite on his feet properly, Clarence was piling freshly cooked bacon and eggs onto two plates, reaching into the grill and pulling out toast to add to the plates all while singing terribly off key and ridiculously high pitched. It made her giggle and at the sound, he turned to face her, his hands twisting the knobs on the cooker to turn off all the power.

"What?" He asked her, grinning uncertainly, like he wanted to be seen joining in the joke but wasn't sure what it was.  
"I've not heard you sing in well over a year and you decide the first song you'll sing for me is 'Goodbye Stranger' by Supertramp?" She asked him as she moved to sit at the table, watching his face relax into a more genuinely amused grin as he brought the plates over, setting one in front of her and one on the opposite side of the table.  
"Well, I like that song." He told her, sprinkling salt over his eggs before picking up his knife and fork and tucking in.  
"Shame you can't sing it!" she told him teasingly, biting into her own toast, but scowling at the taste. Clarence frowned at her a little in confusion, then rolled his eyes as he realised what was wrong. Getting back up from the table, he went over to the cupboard and came back with two glasses, a large carton of orange juice and a jar of peanut butter. Meg reached for the peanut butter immediately and spread it thickly across her toast before biting into it again and smiling in satisfaction.

"I will never understand how you can eat peanut butter with a fried breakfast, Meg." Clarence told her, pouring orange juice into both their glasses and drinking half his own glass in one.  
"Peanut butter is the food of the Gods." She retorted around her mouthful, a small smirk playing on her face as she swallowed. "So anyway!" She said, leaning forward to catch his attention. "Bacon, eggs, toast, OJ, peanut butter... what gives? Is today my birthday?"  
"No..." He replied slowly, popping bacon into his mouth and chewing a little before replying. "I just thought you deserved a treat. You've done so much for me over the last year, I felt I... you know... owed you something back." Meg rolled her own eyes back at him.  
"I'm your wife, Clarence, it's what we do." She told him, breaking the yolk of her egg with her knife and using it to spread the yellow goo all over her bacon. "But I'm not complaining!"

They continued to eat in silence until all the food was finished. Meg sat back in her chair, patting her stomach contentedly. Clarence sat back in his own, bringing his orange juice with him so he could carry on sipping at it while they spoke.  
"What are your plans for today?" He asked her, his foot rubbing up and down her leg under the table. Meg leaned her head back and sighed, rubbing a hand down her face.  
"I have to head over to Saint Lucifer's." She told him, sounding world weary. Clarence's gaze shot up to her.  
"You're going to the jail? Why?" He asked her, frowning a little worriedly.  
"Mom got busted for breaking into some guy's house 8 months ago and her sentence finishes today." Meg told him, not meeting his eyes.  
"And they only gave Bela 8 months? How did she swing that one?" Clarence asked, sipping his orange juice but watching his wife carefully, trying to gauge just how she felt about this.  
"Dad helped her out. Who else?" Meg replied, standing up and collecting their plates, taking them over to the sink to wash.  
"Even with Nick's help I'm still impressed." Clarence stated, his eyebrows raised to emphasise the point. "So you have to go pick her up and take her home because... oh let me guess, your father is working today and your mother and Uncle Alastair are not on speaking terms once again."  
"Gold star for you, feathers." Meg told him as she dried her hands off on a towel, then walking over to sit beside him at the table so the two were closer and could talk easier.

"I expect I'll be gone for a few hours. Who would you like me to call to come stay with you?" She asked him, wrapping her hand in his and smiling gently at him. "Sam and Dean are both working today, Lisa is at Ben's school for some show he's in and we can't really ask Jessica, she only got home a month ago. I could get in contact with Anna or Sebastian though if you like?"   
Clarence screwed up his face. "I've already impeded too much on my siblings. I'd prefer not to." He replied, feeling a little ashamed.  
"Well what about Sam's parents John and Mary? Or I could call Dean's parents Bobby and Ellen. You always liked Bobby and I think his sister Jo is back from camp this week..."  
"Meg!" Clarence cut in, smiling and cupping her face with his hand. "How about we just don't call anyone?"  
"What?" She said, staring at him with disbelief all over her face. He smiled at her.  
"Well, look, I've been feeling great the last few days. you said it yourself I've been doing better. If I don't leave the house I think I could be fine here on my own. I can clean the kitchen and the bathroom, give you a break from all the chores you've had to do for once and when you get back from your parent's house I can have dinner made waiting for you to cheer you up, how does that sound?"  
"Honestly, Clarence? It sounds like a disaster waiting to happen." she told him matter-of-factly, staring at him as though waiting for the moment when he'd jump up and yell "joke!" at her.

"Meg..." He sighed in frustration, standing up from the table and pulling his fingers through his hair. "We can't keep doing this, Meg. We can't keep getting our friends and family to babysit me like some child. I'm a grown man for gosh sakes, how long are we going to keep this up? Until I die? I mean, yeah that could be any day now, but it could also be in decades to come. Are we still going to be asking Sam and Dean to watch over me when we're old and their children have children?"

Meg was speechless. She just could not think what to say. How could she sit there and remind her husband that there was no way he was going to live for one decade never mind multiple? How could she tell him how much it hurt her knowing they'd never have children of their own children? Taking in a deep, shaky breath, she took the cowards way out.  
"Alright." She said, throwing her hands up in defeat. "Alright fine. I'll go pick my mom up and you stay here on your own. Do whatever you have to do Clarence." She told him, standing up. Wrapping her dressing gown a little tighter around herself, she walked out of the kitchen and up the stairs to get dressed, not looking back at him once.

Clarence stood in the kitchen, his bittersweet victory surrounding him. As happy as he was that he had won the discussion, he could not help but feel sad for the way their perfect morning had ended.


	5. Jail Bail and bee hives

The house was eerily quiet without Meg's presence and Clarence was beginning to regret forcing her to leave him at home. He wandered in and out of empty rooms, feeling a little lonely and unsure about what to do with himself until he entered their bedroom, however, when he noticed their laundry basket about three-quarters full. He smiled to himself, deciding he would get some chores done exactly as he had told his wife he would do and strode over to pick the basket up by the handles. But as he reached it, it seemed to turn into a bucket full of water with a set of rosary beads sitting at the bottom. A terrible sense of danger took over him and his wings flared in surprise behind him, grace sizzling in reaction to the black soul that was approaching rapidly. Taking hold of the bucket, he swung it round and threw the contents over the demon, watching as the water splashed on impact and the demon's skin began to blister and fall from the flesh. Taking a single, confident step forward, he reached his hand out and placed it on the burning forehead in front, throwing a threatening smirk at the black, bottomless eyes before him, he allowed his power to shoot through his hand to smite the soul and destroy it, leaving the empty male vessel to fall to the floor.

But instead of a crunch of bones, Clarence saw the bedroom he and his wife shared, now completely covered in their dirty laundry and the empty basket laying across the room, slightly dented from where it had hit the wall and his own hand resting in mid-air before him. He curled his hand into a fist and let it drop to his side with a frustrated sigh.  
"Really, Castiel? While I'm trying to do chores?" He said out loud, hoping the angel would hear his resentment. He sighed again, trying to expel some of the frustration from his body, then walked across the room to pick up the basket. Reaching in, he tried popping the dent back out so Meg wouldn't be able to guess what had happened. The dent came out fairly easily, the wicker popping right back to its original shape and sending up a silent prayer of thanks, he sank to his knees and began cleaning up the mess he had made.

* * * * *

"You know Darling, I was actually expecting your Uncle Alastair to come pick me up." Bela Masters told her daughter as she opened the passenger side door to the car. Pulling out a small, compact mirror from her purse, she studied her reflection for a moment before continuing. "But I'm glad it was you instead, your father's brother has this way of looking at me... It's positively creepy."  
"He's working today." Meg replied tersely, strapping herself in and inserting the key into the car, turning it until the engine growled to life.  
"He's still managing to hold down a job?" Bela replied, her eyebrows raised as she snapped the compact shut and dropped it back in her purse, placing the purse in the passenger footwell before strapping herself in as Meg eased the car out of the parking space. "Well I will say I'm impressed. In my own opinion he's completely unemployable. His boss must be a real imbecile." She laughed a little, turning to Meg so they could share the joke. But Meg's expression was stone, a muscle jumping in her tense jaw as she watched for a space in the traffic so she could pull out onto the main road and begin driving home. "Oh don't be so cold with me Megara." Bela sighed, facing forward again and resting her head against the headrest of her seat. "You could at least make some small talk."  
"Only if you promise never to call me that again." Meg bit out between clenched teeth. "My name is Meg."  
"Fine. Meg!" Her mother shot back with a huff of frustration.

An uncomfortable silence filled the car for a few moments, both women studying the road as Meg drove until it became too much and Meg sighed once again.  
"So what will you do now you've been released?" She asked, slowing down as they approached a set of traffic lights that were red, but speeding back up once again when they flicked to amber and then green. "Are you going to keep your old house?"  
"I should think so." Bela replied with a small smile. "That house is lovely."  
"Even if it is bought with dirty money." Meg muttered under her breath.  
"Money is money, Meg, no matter where it comes from." She replied, glancing at her daughter for a second. "Besides, I bought that house with the inheritance from grandaddy's death which was entirely my right."  
"Except that you're the reason he's dead." Meg shot back.  
"There's a reason it's called a car accident, Meg. I didn't purposefully drive the car into that tree, I could easily have been killed too!"

The angry huff the two women let out almost mirrored one another perfectly and sent the car back into the same awkward silence as before. Meg refused to be the one to end it this time and it was five minutes before Bela took her turn.  
"I might get back in contact with that lovely old lady Gert. Remember the one living on the coast?" Bela tried, her face softening a little as she spoke of her old client. "It's been a while since I did a good old fashioned séance for her and I'm sure that moggy of hers will be dead by now. No doubt she'll want to talk to it. Besides, I heard she was having another of her Maritime parties at the museum again. It's been a while since I got to wear a pretty dress and my pearls. You could come too if you'd like. Do you still have that little black dress I bought you for your 21st birthday?"  
"Yes, I do." Meg replied, a little of the cold harshness leaving her voice, grateful for the safe subject Bela had changed to.

"We would look such the pair!" Bela said happily, a grin almost breaking her face in half. "I'm sure I have a spare pair of pearls you could borrow. We'd turn up and make the evening for old Gert, she's not seen you since you were so tiny, she'd be overjoyed to see you so grown up. We'd leave that basket-case of a husband of yours behind of course, no need to put Gert through trying to have a conversation with him that makes sense...." Bela completely missed the way her daughter's knuckles were suddenly turning white on the steering wheel in contrast to the angry flush creeping up her cheeks. It was barely 20 minutes since her mother had been released from prison and already she was insulting Clarence. "... and we would own that party! Everyone would be so delighted and then we could fade into the background. When they're not paying attention we could sneak up the stairs. I heard she has a 'Hand of Glory' in one of the higher rooms, we could get a really good price for that, I'd just have to get in contact with Luke. He might even pay enough for us to be able to pay the bail on your father... MEG!!" Bela screamed as the car came to a sudden squealing stop in the middle of the road.

"Get out." Meg said, calmly and quietly but with all the menace of a wild animal.  
"Meg, what has gotten into you?" Bela cried, turning to face her daughter, her expression pure shock.

"20 minutes, mother. You've been out of jail and in my car for 20 minutes and you've already managed to insult my husband and cook up yet another crazy ass money making scheme by once again robbing off some poor unsuspecting pensioner which is exactly what got you into jail in the first place and for what? To get dad out of jail? After he murdered all those people?" Meg growled at the windscreen, then turning so Bela could see the firey anger in her eyes. "I don't want to hear any of it. You can find your own way home just get out of my car and don't try and talk to me again until I've had chance to cool down enough to know I'm not going to punch your lights out. Get out, mother!"

Bela's mouth opened and closed, no words making it past the shock and confused state of her mind as she listened to Meg's ragged and heavy breathing. Finally, she picked her purse up off the floor of the car and stepped out, closing the door after herself and watching as Meg drove away, her wheels spinning in place for a second in a desperate attempt to put as much distance between herself and her mother as possible.

Meg didn't slow down until long after Bela had disappeared out of her rear view mirror. She kept driving, her mind nothing but a swirling mass of red and black smoke at the fury she felt towards her own family. As if it wasn't bad enough her Uncle Alastair had made her pick her mother up because he was 'working', which essentially meant he was picking up a new stash of ecstasy pills from his supplier to sell to children coming out of high school, but now her mother was planning to not only steal once again from this Gert woman but to then use the money to free Nick from jail after he had gone on a bloodbath murder spree and wiped out an entire village of people, saying not a one of them deserved life and that he needed the money in the village to treat her mother to something really special.

Meg drove to her favourite look-out point, on a cliff edge high above the town looking out over the buildings. She often drove up here when she needed a rest from the emotional hardships of living with Clarence. From up here, the whole town and all her problems seemed so much smaller and the forest behind the ledge filled her car with soothing sounds that helped her heart-rate return to normal. Digging her phone out of her pocket, she hit the speed dial and lifted the phone to her ear.

"'Afternoon, you've reached the Smith's Roadhouse, Ellen Smith speakin'." Came the familiar tones of Dean Smith's mother, the chatter of bar patrons surrounding her voice.  
"Hey Ellen, it's Meg." She sighed, leaning forward and resting her head on the steering wheel.  
"Uh oh. Now there's a stressed out voice if ever I heard one." Ellen replied, her voice instantly filling with worry. A clinking sound came over the line and Meg smiled a weary smile at the image of Ellen stood behind the Roadhouse bar, the phone wedged between her ear and shoulder as she polished a wine glass or some such as she spoke. "Everythin' alright honey?"  
"I just went to pick my mother up from jail. She's out." Meg explained.  
"Ah. Say no more sweetie. Now what can I do to make your life a lil' easier?"

Meg smiled again, relief washing through her as she wished Ellen Smith was her real mother rather than Bela.  
"I left Clarence at home-"  
"You did what?" Ellen cut her off, the glass clinking in the background again and the bar noises becoming muffled as a door banged. "You left him at home alone? Sweetie, you should have called me. Either me or Bobby would have been over there in seconds and we could have kept an eye on him for you, you know you can always come to us with anything."  
"I know Ellen, but he insisted. He really thought he would be ok today and told me not to call anyone. The only other alternative would have been bringing him with me to pick up my mother."  
"Well that would have been a disaster." Ellen admitted.  
"Exactly. So I hope you don't mind doing me a favour and running over there to check on him? I... I need a while alone."  
"Of course I don't mind." Ellen told her, the worry back in her voice. "But don't you go wallowing in your own misery. If you need a friend, you come on over here and drinks are on the house. Or get in contact with Mary and John, Sam and Jess, Lisa and Dean, anyone sweetie. You don't have to suffer in silence, you know that right?"  
"I know that. Thanks Ellen." Meg replied before hanging up.

Slouching down in her chair, Meg sighed out one last big breath, trying to rid herself of all the negative things she was feeling in that one burst of air and clear her mind of the red and black smoke so she could relax a little and allow the calm of nature surrounding her to ease her mind. She felt her shoulders fall from their tense position next to her neck and her muscles let go of everything she had been feeling angry about. But without all that anxiety and tension left to hold her up, she felt herself begin to crumble.

It began with her mouth, just like always; the corners curling up and her bottom lip sticking out a little while her chin began that odd wiggling it does while the tear ducts leak and fill the eyes with fluid. Soon enough, the fluid is spilling over the edge, slowly at first, the tears running perfect lines down the cheeks and creating a pathway for all the other tears to follow, then faster and not so perfect. With the first big sob, coming from somewhere deep in the chest and racing up to drag air into the body at too fast a pace, the tears get completely confused and soon enough the entire face is wet, salty and every negative thought or feeling comes rushing out in a cascade of misery and gloom.

Meg didn't bother wiping her face dry, or her nose. She didn't try to breathe properly or make her sobs any quieter. She sat there in her car, looking over the town and cried until her head stopped hurting and there was no more fluid to wash down her face. She cried out her frustrations at her husband, her anger at her mother, her loneliness that had started just after the accident when she felt like not a single person in the world could relate to her because no-one else had had their world, their life destroyed quite as thoroughly or completely as she had.

After a while she managed to calm herself. Her thoughts had morphed into more of a "What am I supposed to do?" track and she was trying to think of a way of getting her mother out of her criminal ways, think of a way to handle going back to look after her husband and herself when the shrill tones of her phone cut into the silence. Sniffling, she wiped her face clean and took a few deep, shaky breaths to hide what she had been doing before answering.

"Hello?" She greeted the person on the other end, proud that her voice was fairly steady.  
"Hey, Meg?" Came the answering voice of Ellen Harvelle.  
"Hey Ellen. Is everything alright?" She asked, clearing her throat and having another go at drying her face, pulling down the sun visor in front of her and flipping up the cover so she could see her reflection in the mirror there. Scowling at her red rimmed eyes and shiny wet face, she began meticulously drying every wet spot she could see.  
"You did say Clarence was at your house, right?" Ellen replied, her own voice sounding unsure.  
"Yes, why?" Meg half demanded, dread beginning to blossom in her chest.  
"Well... Sweetie he's not here." Ellen sighed, sounding stressed. "I've looked everywhere - kitchen, living room, downstairs bathroom, wash kitchen, your bedroom, the nursery, upstairs bathroom, conservatory, heck I even checked the garden but there's no sign of him. Apart from the washer being on."  
"But... But that makes no sense..." Meg stammered, that doubt now completely unfurling and transforming into panic. "He has to be there, he wouldn't leave the house on his own."  
"Sorry sweetie, I honestly don't know where he is." Ellen said, a slapping sound in the background like she had flailed her hand against her thigh. "Listen, I'm gonna call Sam and Dean down at the hospital, make sure he's not wandered over there. I'll call Mary and John too, make sure he's not gone visiting. Then I'll run back over to the Roadhouse and hope he's just wandered over for a beer or something, alright? We'll find him Meg, don't you worry."

Meg didn't reply. She hung up the phone and tossed it onto the seat next to her. Turning the car back on, she almost flooded the engine with how hard she floored the pedal, reversing back to the road and flying back home at speeds she normally wouldn't even think about. Squealing to a stop in front of the house, she stumbled out of the car and looked up at their home. The house was peaceful, Ellen having already left to get back to the Roadhouse. Meg looked up and saw their bedroom window was still open but other than that there was nothing out of the ordinary about what she was looking at, other than the horrible fear gripping her heart and crawling up her throat.

"CLARENCE!!!" She screamed at the house, hoping to see his confused face appearing in one of the windows, but after a minute or two it was evident that simply wasn't going to happen. Her knees were going weak and she was about to sink to the floor in desperation and despair when a voice cut across her thoughts.

"It's alright Meg, he's in my garden."

Meg spun on the spot to see the last person in the world she ever thought she would find. Timothy Cain, their next door neighbour was a shy man. He had never once spoken to her before, choosing to stay away from any and all neighbourhood parties or get-togethers and instead staying locked in his own house. Meg couldn't remember a time she had ever seen him leave the front door but here he was, looking her up and down with his hazel eyes creased with worry and sympathy.  
"You know that boy has a real interest in bees?" He asked her, gesturing back to the house with a small gardening implement, she thought was a trowel, in his hand.  
"N...no I didn't actually." Meg replied, frowning a little in confusion but hardly daring to hope this mad old man from the house next door had actually taken her husband in.  
"Apparently." Cain smirked, staring back at the house. "I installed a new hive closer to the house recently, a bigger one because the nest was growing too fast and I guess your husband must have noticed. Came over and asked if he could watch them for a time and ended up helping me out in my garden. Real nice fella and I'll tell you something little lady, he worships the ground you walk on. Not shut up about you since he came round. You must be Meg."  
"And you're Mr Cain." She replied, bewildered by everything that was happening, but still remembering to extend her hand and shake the one Cain extended back as a way of greeting.  
"Just Cain'll do." He told her, nodding once to let her know it was ok to let go of his hand and turning slightly, still watching her. "There's a path to the side of the house, see it? He's down that path and out back. Go ahead."

Meg sighed a little and smiled at Cain to let him know her gratitude before making her way down the path, the old man close behind her. As the path moved past the final corner of the house, it opened out onto a terrace area with a step down to a grassy lawn, surrounded by all kinds of flowers. A pond broke up the sea of green in the middle and there was a large brown shed in the back right hand corner. The hive built next to the shed was huge and humming with the sound of bees and there, sat on the garden before the hive was Clarence, working away on a small tray filled with dirt and a packet of seeds that was resting precariously against his thigh. Meg stood still for a moment, taking in the tranquil stillness of his expression, the way his back was completely relaxed and how his whole demeanour was peaceful and content. Cain came to stand beside her for a second and through her peripheral vision she saw him watching her with a slight smile on his face, but she simply could not take her gaze off her husband. After a minute, he carried on walking, going right up to Clarence and placing a hand on his shoulder.

"Hey boy, you know your wife is here?" Cain asked him in a gentle voice as if not to startle him. The technique seemed to work because Clarence replied by nodding his head and smiling down at his tray as he pressed another seed into a hole he had made with his finger.  
"Of course Meg is here." He said to Cain, who stood behind him and watched his work. "She takes wonderful care of me. I expect she was worried to hear I had left the house."  
"Mmhmm. Well don't you want to go say hi?" Cain prompted him, nudging him gently with the toe of his shoe. But Meg had already made her own way over.

"Hi Clarence." She greeted her husband, sitting next to him. Seeing the way he was gathering the dirt up carefully with his fingers and dropping it into the hole where he had placed the seed, she leant over and began doing the same to help him. "What are you doing outside?"  
"I was watching the bees Meg." Clarence told her with a smile, the two gently pressing the dirt down flat in the tray, then starting work on planting the next seed.

Suddenly he stopped working and sat back. He crossed his legs underneath him and leant back, smiling at Meg and letting his focus wander all round the garden.  
"Isn't it just majestic, Meg?" He asked her as she sat back to copy his position. "I was inside, looking at the weather and remembering what it felt like to have the sun on my face, the wind in my hair and I wanted nothing more but to experience it all once again. Then I saw Mr Cain in his garden and decided I was going to do it. I was going to come outside. So I did. He brought me over to the bee hive and told me about why they needed more space and what he was doing to help them and suddenly, I could see it."  
"See what, Clarence?" Meg asked, watching his face, tense and ready for the moment he would realise he was outside and undoubtedly have a panic attack. But it didn't seem to be coming.  
"I could see everything. The whole... divine plan. I could see the plants growing, the bees working so tirelessly to create the jelly they would use to feed their queen and let the circle of life continue. The rain falling to Earth, the sun warming it and the wind carrying the scents to the bees and butterflies and the whole thing like a giant machine working meticulously and perfectly while you humans go about your daily lives, not once stopping to appreciate just how... breathtaking the world around us really is."

Meg looked up at Cain, expecting to see the same judgemental look she received from everyone when Clarence went off on one of his insane lectures. But all she saw on his face was affection.  
"There's never enough appreciation in this world, huh Clarence?" Cain asked him, bending down and taking the packet of seeds off him. Clarence's face turned to look at Cain, his expression a mask of nervousness and confusion at having the seeds taken off him. "It's alright son, you've done a grand job there but plant anymore and they won't grow properly." Cain explained patiently.

Clarence frowned. "I am not your son." He told Cain, standing up as the old man did, handing over the tray. "I have no possible familial ties with you, you are our neighbour."  
"And friend, it would seem." Meg cut across quickly as she stood to join the two men, trying to cover that Clarence clearly wasn't Clarence anymore.  
"Friend? Yeah ok, I could have the two of you as friends." Cain replied with a nod.  
"Clarence, I think it's time we went home and left Cain to his garden now, don't you think?" Meg asked him, placing a hand on his shoulder and beginning to guide him back to their own house.  
"Thank you for showing me your garden, Cain." Clarence said.  
"Anytime boy, come visit if you'd like to work some more." He offered back, smiling as the two retreated back to the house.


End file.
